Thank you all for your kindness - CWarrior and May and Scout. I really appreciate them such a lot.
So, weirdly enough - H has announced that he has had an initial phone consultation with a solicitor and is getting the paperwork sent through to him. This man has never filled out a form in his life without hand-holding and careful supervision, so this will be interesting. I texted him the details of my solicitor and said he was free to have anything he wanted dealing with in terms of practicalities sent there and given this was a legal process, neither his or my opinions on it mattered that much at the moment, only the facts and figures, and I would be letting the solicitors deal with that.
He also said that he wanted Eldest to see a therapist. Eldest was seeing a therapist until lockdown, and will be starting again soon as the schools re-open. I reminded him of that. I also reminded him that the therapist had given us very specific suggestions for setting boundaries around angry behaviour, had said that Eldest's challenging behaviour was totally in the realms of normal for a boy his age, and that it was a systemic problem caused by the variance in our parenting and that is why we'd both been invited to participate in the conversations. I reminded him that H had refused to come to any of the meetings or talk to the therapist on the phone, and that he'd rejected all the suggestions and said that he'd preferred to parent 'on instinct'.
These are things i would normally keep to myself in the sake of peace, but I think if I have to speak to him, I am only going to tell the truth from now on and that means not going along with the self-serving, passive aggressive fictions he needs to me to collaborate in. Because I calmly disagreed with him and he does not like that, he started with another of his tantrums and started with the mocking impressions of me crying (I wasn't crying - I was stone cold calm and if I had an expression on my face, it would have been a mixture of boredom and contempt) and when he started up with that, I laughed at him and then left the house with the dog for a couple of hours.
It's actually very freeing not to feel like I need to constantly fake deference to him so he feels good, and I can just live my own truth - which is I will respect him as a human being, communicate civilly, and when it is appropriate, speak my truth. He consistently exaggerates everything - Eldest refusing to do a household chore and slamming the door as he leaves the room (which is not acceptable behaviour) turns into - in his father's eyes - 'screaming and shouting and ruining the day' and my saying 'if you ask me a question then you need to let me answer' turns into me being 'hysterical' - his lies and exaggerations are things I've let pass too, understanding that perhaps he is just so sensitive to conflict that it really feels that way to him, and I should validate his experience. But I don't care to validate his nonsense any more: what is actually happening is that he doesn't seem to be able to cope with living with people he can't control. Youngest has a very easy going nature, and is of course a much younger child. When she gets older and has her own mind, I am sure H will find that threatening too. I believe - and I know I've said this before - he mistakes anything other than obedience to his wishes to be my controlling him, and that is because he does not have the skills and control over his own emotions to have a conversation about collaborative solutions, and he does not have the humility to change his course or take feedback once his mind is made up on something. I believe our marriage collapsed because in his passive aggression he swallowed his own needs, didn't speak for them and resented my not meeting them. And because when he left that space, I moved forward and filled it with my own stuff. I am more intelligent and articulate than he is, more confident, and more relationship-focussed. When he moved back in, my hope was that I would pull back and take care of more of my own needs, and that he'd take responsibility for speaking up for his own needs and involving himself in the myriad conversations, compromises and negotiations that make up family life. I think in his heart of hearts he doesn't want to do that, or doesn't have the skills to do it and doesn't have the humility to learn them. My truth at the moment is that I think he's an enormous child who isn't happy and isn't willing to take action to make changes to make himself happy, and wants to shout at Mommy. And Mommy isn't going to be shouted at any longer.
Given that I am more intelligent, capable, confident and articulate than he is, and given that over the past year or so I've got really good at opening up my life to my friends, meeting my own needs, and setting my boundaries, he isn't going to know what has hit him when I stop inviting him to collaborate and start going my own way, living in the best interests of myself and my kids, and ignoring his tantrums. I suspect he will massively escalate, but I am prepared to have him removed from the house, levering the time I had to call the police on him two years ago (which I have a record of, as does my solicitor) if necessary. I don't feel scared of him, but if I have to use that, I will.
